Christmas on Candy Cane Lane

I read the other reviews and thought I would write one. I found this movie hiliariously funny while teaching valuable life lessons on how to get along with others and forgive. Definitely worth the watch! All of the cast were perfect for their roles! Great to see Andrea Barber in a leading role for the first time!! Andrea was true to her personality--seriously funny!! I loved Dan Payne, Devon Alexander, and the ladies that played Tilda and Mrs. Walters. I enjoyed this movie tremendously! If you want funny and heartwarming, you will find it when watching this movie! Thank the Lord for a movie that contains clean, funny, true to life mishaps!! Enjoy!!

This is the Christmas movie formula we all know and love. The main couple with their problems, the other couple with their comedic interactions, the grumpy person that adds the element of stress to the main character. Just lighthearted Christmas for fun at its best.

This plot is perfectly thin, you can guess how things turn out right from the start, but that's what Christmas movies are about. Like a blanket and a warm cup of hot chocolate they are meant to be warm and comfortable with just a hint of merriment.

The cast is all fun, and they look like they are having fun. Even the obligatory teenage girl is not obnoxious.

All in all, a nice way to spend an evening.

If not for Dan Payne, this wouldn't be worth the time it takes to watch. I'm not sure who decided Andrea Barber could carry the lead in a movie, but they were wrong. She is cute, and would be fine in a supporting role. It actually looks as if they are trying to hide a pregnancy, but at 46, I think she is too old for that.

The movie tries to be heart-warming but just doesn't get there. At times it goes for silly, and doesn't quite make that work either.

Dan and Andrea have zero chemistry as a divorced couple trying to keep things good for their teen daughter as the holidays approach.

Throw in an obnoxious neighbor, a prankster, a female cop dealing with the tragic death of her fiancé, and a veteran trying to woo her, and you end up up with 90 minutes of meh.

One of the worst I've seen from GAF.

The Christmas on Candy Cane Lane writers went for absurdity and touching in the same movie, and they never sold me on either mode.

When you have a film where you're relieved when one character isn't in a scene, that's a bad sign. And not because you have a bad guy you don't like but just because the character is constantly annoying.

The whole subplot about "vandalizing candy canes" by moving them around was a non-starter for me. It wasn't serious enough to raise concern, nor funny enough to be amusing.

On the sentimental side, we have divorced parents coming to terms over their daughter and possibly becoming close again and an accused prankster who clearly isn't going to be the culprit.

More than halfway in, I looked over at my wife and said, "At an hour and sixteen minutes into the movie, I'm thinking it should have established SOMETHING I care about." Oops, and just after that Miss Annoying Neighbor walked into another scene to ruin it. We didn't turn it off but probably should have.

This is so hectoring and hard to take seriously. I gather this is intended to be a "film with a moral" but, if you want to produce a film that extols the virtues of reconciliation and renewal, you do need to write a believable screenplay.

I really struggled to see Rob (played by Dan Payne) as a well-rounded and consistent character. If someone had been through a traumatic experience, wouldn't he have at least shown some small amount of nervousness about jumping back in the deep end?

Since this is really built on the past, present and future of the relationship between Rob and Ivy (played by Andrea Barber), it fails to enthrall because the way their relationship evolves is simply implausible. So, all in all, a real dud of a Christmas film.